Legislation now introduced in the Michigan House and Senate would exempt students working part-time at a community college from contributing to the Michigan Public School Employees Retirement System. Co-sponsor state Senator John Proos tells WSJM News, right now, community colleges are told their part-time students do have to pay into the MPSERS. That doesn’t make sense to him.
“You can imagine that a part time student may have no interest in participating in a school retirement system,” Proos said.
According to the Senate Fiscal Agency, more than half of the state’s 28 community colleges do not contribute to MPSERS for part-time student employees, and no community college contributes for full-time students. However, some colleges, like Southwestern Michigan College, have been in a battle with the state for being required to take contributions for MPSERS from part-time students. Proos says the new legislation will fix that.
